Good point about the mandated law, I forgot about that/didn't realize it, so I retract the statement about the judge's fault.
I honestly have never looked in detail at the sex offenders list or the law surrounding it, I can say that when my brother told me about his neighbor I made the comment that I didn't feel we should judge him solely on that since it's easy to get convicted and put on that list wrongly, but that a little caution is in order to err on the side of safety.
And you're right, complaining about it on HN instead of writing the state officials is definitely not the productive way to handle it, but this is also the first time I've had to really THINK about the law in detail. I can see why the law would need to be adjusted to actually better protect people instead of blacklisting whenever remotely possible.
I'm not personally attacking you, but that's the point of the articles. According the Georgia law (the blow job example), that woman is on the sex offender list and her offense is listed as "sodomy". Georgia's creative definition pretty much causes that woman to be on the receiving end of a lot of reactionary hatred and possibly puts her in danger, because people have no idea what her actual "crime" was. A lot of people don't think beyond hearing "sex offender" and "children".
There's a constant climate of fear concerning sexual crimes, especially ones that involve children, that are making us do very irrational things to feel safer.
Also, I appreciate your commentary on your personal feelings about this issue. It's a complex issue and I think some of the down-votes might've been a bit too hasty.
I honestly have never looked in detail at the sex offenders list or the law surrounding it, I can say that when my brother told me about his neighbor I made the comment that I didn't feel we should judge him solely on that since it's easy to get convicted and put on that list wrongly, but that a little caution is in order to err on the side of safety.
And you're right, complaining about it on HN instead of writing the state officials is definitely not the productive way to handle it, but this is also the first time I've had to really THINK about the law in detail. I can see why the law would need to be adjusted to actually better protect people instead of blacklisting whenever remotely possible.